back-order something

[for a merchant] to order something that is not in stock and make delivery to the customer when the goods become available. The store didn't have the replacement part for my vacuum cleaner, so the manager back-ordered it for me.The shop had to back-order some of the items on my list.

back order

An item not currently in stock but to be sold or delivered when it becomes available, as in We don't have the shoes in white, but we can make them a back order. The verb back-order means "to obtain such an item," as in The furniture store is going to back-order the sofa for us.

Although there are other common performance measures, such as issue effectiveness (IE) and back order days, also known as delay or conditional wait time, conditional wait time is a more complete measure.

David Ost, North West Regional Director at EEF, said: "Manufacturing indicators hit a soft patch at the end of last year as events in global markets weighed on confidence and held back orders growth in some sectors.

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